894 



EGLANTINE EHRETIACE^:. 



extremities of those branches they soon get into it, 

 and make their escape ; but they frequently ascend, 

 and are found crawling and wriggling about in the 

 meadows, where also they can move to a consider- 

 able distance, especially if there are little pools, 

 which serve them as a sort of inns, or resting places, 

 on their way. In consequence of this power of 

 climbing, and also of moving over land, eels are 

 much more capable of distributing themselves gene- 

 rally throughout all the waters of humid places, than 

 perhaps any other kind offish. On these migrations, 

 and also when they are ascending the shallows near 

 the banks of the rivers, vast numbers of them are 

 seized by nerons and other wading birds. Indeed, 

 where they are numerous, eels arc the favourite food 

 of the heron ; and after a summer shower has favoured 

 their ascent into the upland brooks, herons may b 

 observed watching for them with great assiduity, in 

 places where there is no heronry within many miles. 

 See the article HERON. 



In countries farther to the south, eels are still more 

 abundant than they are in any part of Britain ; and 

 in those places they form no inconsiderable part of 

 the food of the larger wading birds, such as cranes 

 and storks. They are exceedingly numerous in the 

 river Po, as the lagunes and banks at the mouth of 

 that river, on the latter of which the city of Venice 

 is built, are peculiarly favourable as breeding places 

 for them, lu no place, however, is there any danger 

 of confounding fresh water eels with those which are 

 permanent inhabitants of the sra, and never ascend 

 the fresh waters, though, like the others, they appear 

 to resort to the shallows and brackish waters for the 

 purpose of breeding. 



The general characters of the whole of the eel 

 family, which is a very natural one, are, the body 

 elongated, the skin very thick, generally without 

 any scales, and rendered exceedingly slippery, by 

 a mucous secretion ; their intestines are without any 

 caecum, and the greater number of them have air 

 bladders. The true eels have the pectoral fins very 

 far forward, and thegill openings, which are very small, 

 placed immediately under those fins ; the stomach, 

 or long cul-de-sac, and the intestine, nearly straight ; 

 the air-bladder very much elongated, and with a 

 gland placed at the middle of its length ; and they 

 have the dorsal fin beginning at a considerable dis- 

 tance behind the pectorals. The fresh water eels 

 have also the upper jaw shorter than the lower one, 

 while the sea eels have the shorter lower than the 

 upper, and in them the dorsal fin begins much nearer 

 the pectorals than in the fresh water eels. 



This difference of structure in regard to the com- 

 mencement of the dorsal fin, shows that the two are 

 fitted for progressive motion of a different kind. The 

 pectoral fins in the fresh water eel keep the head 

 steady to its course ; and the portion of the back 

 which is without a dorsal, obeys the motion of the 

 head, so that the fore part of the fish can proceed 

 steadily in a straight line, at the same time that the 

 body, behind the commencement of the dorsal, per- 

 forms those motions which are necessary to project 

 the whole forward. In both the sea and fresh water 

 eels, the dorsal and anal fins meet at the extremity 

 of the tail ; and thus the whole of the posterior part 

 of the body is a sort of paddle, by means of which 

 they work themselves along, something in the same 

 manner as a boat is worked along by sculling with 

 one oar, worked right and left across the middle of j 



the stern. In the British waters there arc, at 

 least, two species of fresh water eels, which are 

 distinguished as the sharp-nosed eel and the broad- 

 nosed eel. The colours of both these are nearly the 

 same ; but the broad-nosed one is rather thicker in 

 proportion to the length, and has the head larger and 

 the gape wider. It is also said to be fuller of flesh 

 and more juicy than the other, though this, no doubt, 

 depends in a great measure upon the season at which 

 it is taken, and the water which it frequents There 

 is nothing, however, so strikingly different in either 

 the appearance or the habits of those two species, as 

 to call for any particular description of them as dis- 

 tinguished from each other. 



The great interest of these fishes is in the pecu- 

 liarity of their manners, and the mistakes and absur- 

 dities which have so long prevailed on the subject 

 of them. There is, indeed, another point of view in 

 which they are worthy of some consideration : it is 

 probable that before many years have elapsed, eels 

 may be the only fish obtainable in the lower parts of 

 those rivers where our great manufacturing towns 

 are situated, and where the refuse of gas-works, and 

 countless other impurities are continually discharged 

 into the water. Those impurities generally float on 

 the surface, or, at least, very near it, and thus they 

 are fatal to salmon, trout, and all other fishes which 

 swim near the surface ; but if the water is of any 

 considerable depth, the eel is sufficiently far down to 

 breed in safety. 



EGLANTINE is the Rosa cglanteria of Linnaeus, 

 a wild species of rose common in many parts of 

 Europe. A bramble introduced from New Holland 

 in 18-25 is also called eglantine. 



EGYPTIAN LOTUS is the famous Nympha:a 

 Lotus of Linnaeus, a magnificent aquatic plant, abun- 

 dant in the Nile, and in most of the tropical and 

 other rivers of Africa and Eastern Asia. The leaves 

 are ample, peltate, and mostly float on the surface of 

 the water ; the flowers are large and showy, and the 

 main stems of the plant creep in the mud, are jointed 

 tubers and esculent. The canals in China are in 

 some places literally choked up by this plant, but it 

 is in that empire an inexhaustible source of food for 

 the poorer inhabitants, who use the tubers as potatoes 

 are used in Europe. The order Nymphceqcece is 

 pretty generally distributed. The Nclumbiums of 

 Africa and China, the Nymphce (water-lily) of Europe 

 and America, and the Euryale of India, are all 

 included in the order. The Nymphcea nelumbo, now 

 called Nelumbium speciosum, was first flowered in 

 England at Bulstrode, the seat of the Duke of 

 Portland, about the year 1790. 



EGYPTIAN THORN is the Acacia vera of 

 Willdenow. an ornamental tree, native of the northern 

 parts of Africa. 



EHRETIA (Linnaeus). A genus of tropical trees 

 and shrubs, belonging to the fifth class of Linnajus, 

 and to the natural order EhretiacecE. Generic charac- 

 ter : calyx five-toothed, or cut irregularly; corolla 

 bell or funnel shaped, limb five-cleft ; stamens having 

 awl-shaped filaments inserted in the tube ; anthers 

 two-lobed at the base, two-celled, and protruding ; 

 style divided, bearing acute or obtuse stigmas ; drupe 

 bony, two-seeded, sometimes four-seeded ; embryo 

 inverted. These exotics thrive well in the hothouse, 

 and are easily propagated by cuttings. 



EHRETIACEJS. A natural order of dicotyle- 

 donous plants, containing only a few genera and 



